Over the last decades, archaeological knowledge of precontact Native American life has expanded dramatically. The roughly 10 to 15 millennia that separate the peopling of this variegated land mass from the arrival of Columbus are recognized as an era of population spread, technological innovation, and cultural diversification. In some regions, these centuries are marked by the origins of agriculture and the rise of urban states. Yet the indigenous peoples of the Americas also included sedentary coastal foragers, mobile people who sowed the seeds of domesticated maize, and migratory hunting bands, as well as shamans, slaves, royalty, traders, farmers, artisans, and scribes.
To catalogue the spatial and temporal diversity of the ancient Americans in a single volume is no simple feat. The task may be sufficiently daunting that few syntheses of comparable scope have been completed. In the preface to the first edition of this volume, the author even hints that his research experience as an Old World archaeologist may have been an advantage: it enabled him to approach this expansive subject with a degree of distance and perspective. Nevertheless, Stuart J. Fiedel has delivered a timely and theoretically balanced book that should prove particularly valuable for archaeological neophytes and scholars outside the discipline.
The volume is organized into seven chapters. In the first two, Fiedel provides a brief theoretical introduction to American archaeology and then tackles the controversial issue of human entrance into the Americas. Perhaps reflecting his Old World roots, the author seems particularly comfortable and up-to-date in this latter section, as well as in chapter 3, devoted to the early Paleo-Indian occupation of the hemisphere. Though brief, the concluding chapter, which draws comparisons between the course and processes of history in the Old and New worlds, is intellectually provocative.
The work’s core is chapters 4 to 6, which cover, respectively, post-Pleistocene foragers, the origins of agriculture and village life, and the emergence of complex societies. In these chapters, coverage is organized and subdivided along temporal and spatial lines (reflecting somewhat schizophrenic theoretical underpinnings in both the traditional cultural history and the neoevolutionary framework). The focus thereby shifts frequently from one region to another. As a consequence, the volume has the feel of a primer and does not inadequately transmit an appreciation for the grand sweep of history. Although this is not a fatal flaw, it does diminish the presentation of archaeology’s most important attribute, the description and explanation of human behaviors over great time spans. Nevertheless, on balance, the second edition of the Prehistory of the Americas meets its difficult challenge, and should be considered seriously by those looking for an elementary discussion of the diverse pre-Columbian roots of the Native American peoples.
